Feature Interview: Dr. Gail Krantzberg on Great Lakes issues
Dr. Gail Krantzberg, an authority on the Great Lakes, is a professor at McMaster University, where her focus is on emerging Great Lakes issues as well as developing policies and reviewing governance of these important bodies of water.
Krantzberg worked from 1987 to 2001 for the province of Ontario as a scientist and a senior policy adviser on Great Lakes issues. She has also served on the International Joint Commission’s Water Quality Board and Council Great Lakes Managers Task Force.
With the recent announcement of the US government to label $475 million in the 2010 federal US budget for Great Lakes clean up efforts and last week’s Great Lakes Restoration Conference, MoreCanadian thought it to be a good time to ask Krantzberg some questions about the lakes.
MoreCanadian: What are some of the most pressing environmental issues surrounding the Great Lakes at the moment?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Climate change is having and will continue to have huge effects on the Great Lakes water quality and quality. Invasive species that continue to enter the lakes each year is another huge pressing problem that could destroy both diversity and fisheries in the region. We also grow our cities and the communities in an unsustainable way without considering how land use affects water quality. There is a mass immigration into the Great Lakes (which will probably increase with climate change when other parts of the country go dry) and if we don’t develop our cities right, incrementally we will be putting tremendous amounts of pollutants back into the lakes.
MoreCanadian: You mentioned that climate change will affect the amount of water in the great lakes. Can you elaborate on that?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Almost all models predicting effects of climate change on the lakes are warmer winters, which means less ice, which means water will evaporate during the winter. It also means less accumulation of the snow pack which recharges the lakes in the spring when the watershed needs the water. Even though we have a lot of precipitation in the summer under climate change, it comes in bursts. A long drought and then a huge downpour of rain. Almost all of the models show lake levels dropping anywhere from half a meter to three meters in depth. In shallow areas of the lakes that means the whole near shore area could move a kilometre offshore.
MoreCanadian: What do you say to the people who think, ‘Well there is so much water there; a bit less water wouldn’t make all that much difference’?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: There is this perception that this is a vast amount of water, but whenever I speak out in the media or in conferences, I try and remind people that the Great Lakes are a glacial relic. They are melt water. There is no continuous input of water. Just precipitation which counts for one per cent a year. The rest is just historically there, so if we continue to let it evaporate, that water is not coming back.
The other point is that so many of our communities are built around the Great Lakes to have access to clean fresh water. Well, when the water levels start dropping, those communities are no longer going to be on waterfront, they’ll be inland. All our infrastructure, water intake, sewage outflow industrial intakes, marina’s ports they are all going to be in peril and that will cost billions of dollars. It is not just a matter of, ‘there is going to be enough for us to drink’, but also a matter of how are we going to access it.
I worked in a community in the Georgian Bay where you could actually see the sewage outfall because it was close to shore.
MoreCanadian: What do you think of the announcement by the US government to put $475 million in the 2010 federal US budget for Great Lakes efforts as part of the Restoration Act?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: This is the largest single investment into the Great Lakes in a presidential budget ever. There was the Great Lakes legacy act that under the Bush Administration putting $100 or $200 million into it, so this $475 million is wonderful.
MoreCanadian: Is $475 million a lot of money when talking about Great lakes preservation and clean up, or is it just a drop in the bucket?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: It is a lot compared to what we’ve seen in the past. Compared to the need for investment, there is a lot more to be invested. When Barack Obama in his election campaign announced $5 billion for the great lakes, he had it right. There is a very highly contaminated piece of sediment which costs $450 million or more just to clean up that one area. This is certainly a boost for leveraging partners and a signal to Canada that it is time for them to really invest. We certainly hope Congress will pass it.
MoreCanadian: Any examples of highly contaminated areas in dire need for clean up?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Green Bay Fox River in the US is probably several billion dollars to clean up. Hamilton Harbour, there is a plan to clean up sediment. That alone will cost about $90 million.
MoreCanadian: Can you comment on the treatment of the Asian Carp coming up the Mississippi? We understand they are now just a few miles from the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal.
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: The Asian Carp is a classic example. We’ve been watching that carp come out of Arkansas now for years. We know there is a portal into Lake Michigan and that if it gets into the lakes it will devastate a multi-billion dollar fishery industry and it is strictly a question of investing in the right engineering solution. If we get that wrong, shame on us. We know its there. You can’t see what is in a tank in a ship that comes in from the ocean in the lakes in microscopic larval form that gets discharged into the lakes, but we can see these carp. They are very big. They are underwater vacuum cleaners. They eat everything in their path that all our predatory fish want to eat. Wherever they come into a river, they are 95 per cent of the biomass in that river. Yet we have this barrier, which may be intermittent, it is not run at a high enough voltage. To me what baffles me is the lack of accountability. Who is responsible for keeping those things out? Because we all know they are a disaster waiting to happen.
MoreCanadian: How significant a threat are invasive species?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Every year there are two or three new exotic species and experts say that one in ten will become invasive, so do the math. Once every three years you are going to get an invasive species that surprises us again. It stuns me that we have not been able to figure out how to keep the ocean going vessels from contaminating inland water. There are solutions, but governments are just not putting them into place.
MoreCanadian: How does the US investment of $475 (for one year) compare to what Canada is investing into the lakes?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Canada right now is nowhere to be seen. The good bureaucrats at Environment Canada for example. They put together a plan for five years that would cost Canada $1 billion over five years to do the right thing. In the end they got $40 million. It is a mockery.
MoreCanadian: Who owns more of the Great Lakes, Canada or the US?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: It is shared equally between both nations. If you look at the map, the only lake that is not bi-national is Lake Michigan as it is only in the US. All the other lakes are shared right through the middle.
MoreCanadian: What’s your most favourite place on the Great Lakes?
Dr. Gail Krantzberg: Tough question. I’ll say parts of Lake Huron because I spend so much time working with the community in the town of Collingwood, trying to bring back the harbour to life and we’ve been very successful. Huron seems to be the forgotten lake. We think of the pristine shore of Lake Superior, but no one really talks about Lake Huron it is magnificent. It is in the middle, under stress and on the verge of being in trouble but it can be recovered. Manitoulin Island is the largest fresh water island in the world. Wasaga Beach is the largest fresh water beach in the world. It is really quite magnificent.
